Is there a market for 5 inch+ phones?

The Notes have been highly successful niche devices. Possibly the most popular niche in phones outside the mainstream sizes. But they cost a premium. It's time to see how many people want that enormous screen and touch surface without having to pay for something that is premium in other respects.

So please correct me if my math is incorrect;The Mega is 233dpi, almost half the S3 at 462dpi. This means per square inch, due to the lower density of wires, the Mega has 1/4 the number of wires per square inch. The Mega screen area is only an additional 5.5 square inches, with the same battery, lower powered GPU, lower resolution, and higher 'efficiency' screen.

The iPad 2->3 saw a doubling in DPI, no screen size increase, but a boost in GPU, battery, and LED count to compensate for the resolution increase from 25WH to 42WH. 68% increase in battery with the same screen size to stay at approximately the same battery life.

The Mega increases screen size by only 47%, so it is possible that, with the same battery but lower resolution and DPI screen, that it will in fact see a battery life boost.

The devices’ advanced software also facilitates more efficient processor use for improved battery life, meaning users can enjoy longer talk time and multimedia use.

While they say it is the software and processor, the screen is still the biggest power draw, so I think the drop in resolution would account for the bulk of the increase congruent with the lower powered GPU paired with the screen.

Two new phones the Mega 6.3 and 5.8. Interestingly they have mid-end specs with dual-core processors and relatively low pixel density.Clearly Samsung wants to keep them distinct from the Note series which has top hardware. Prices will probably be $100-200 lower than the Note.

So please correct me if my math is incorrect;The Mega is 233dpi, almost half the S3 at 462dpi. This means per square inch, due to the lower density of wires, the Mega has 1/4 the number of wires per square inch. The Mega screen area is only an additional 5.5 square inches, with the same battery, lower powered GPU, lower resolution, and higher 'efficiency' screen.

The iPad 2->3 saw a doubling in DPI, no screen size increase, but a boost in GPU, battery, and LED count to compensate for the resolution increase from 25WH to 42WH. 68% increase in battery with the same screen size to stay at approximately the same battery life.

The Mega increases screen size by only 47%, so it is possible that, with the same battery but lower resolution and DPI screen, that it will in fact see a battery life boost.

The devices’ advanced software also facilitates more efficient processor use for improved battery life, meaning users can enjoy longer talk time and multimedia use.

While they say it is the software and processor, the screen is still the biggest power draw, so I think the drop in resolution would account for the bulk of the increase congruent with the lower powered GPU paired with the screen.

I think you are seriously overthinking the effect of the emissive and blocking parts of a screen, they will contribute in some part to the overall power consumption, but for typical usage screen power consumption is by far dominated by the backlight itself rather than drawing, and the arrangment of the screen itself tells you not much about that, other than in theory at least less backlighting is needed.

It has a bloody big screen, with LTE, and a SoC that only has extra-thirsty A15s. Samsung, ARM, and Linaro all claim that big.LITTLE saves typically around 60-70% SoC power compared to A15s alone.

I will be very surprised if the battery life is even as good as the S IV never mind better.

Compared to the Note II the 6.3" Mega has a larger screen with the same res, and a more power hungry SoC, and a battery that is only 100 mAh larger. I would expect battery life be below the Note II, and that is in turn below the S IV.

That's my point. If the screen reduces the LED density by 33%, but the surface area by 47%, you actually technically have a lower powered screen.

In other words if you nominally need 10 LEDs to power your S4, increasing the screen size by 47% means you now need 15 LEDs. If you switch to a lower resolution such that your S4 now only needs 7 LEDs, AND then increase your screen size by 47% now you only need 10 LEDs... in both cases then you have the same power draw despite the larger screen. On top of that you have the case that the average LCD draws less power than the average LED, tilting the power advantage very slightly in favor of the Mega.

Everything else is equal except now computationally you have less to draw on screen, meaning then you are using less CPU/GPU on a Mega compared to an S4. So now there are two factors that favor the Mega's power consumption over the S4.

The iPhone 5 is 4". If I had to guess, I'd say both the iPhone 5S and the rumored low-cost iPhone will also be 4", and next year's iPhone 6 will get a little bigger. But I also suspect Apple may shorten the iPhone release cycle, so the iPhone 6 could show up well before fall 2014.

I personally own an iPhone 5, and I've got an S3 from work. I'm fine with Android, but I hate the width of the S3. If Apple starts increasing the size of the iPhone, I'm going to dump them for a smaller Android phone.

That's my point. If the screen reduces the LED density by 33%, but the surface area by 47%, you actually technically have a lower powered screen.

In other words if you nominally need 10 LEDs to power your S4, increasing the screen size by 47% means you now need 15 LEDs. If you switch to a lower resolution such that your S4 now only needs 7 LEDs, AND then increase your screen size by 47% now you only need 10 LEDs... in both cases then you have the same power draw despite the larger screen. On top of that you have the case that the average LCD draws less power than the average LED, tilting the power advantage very slightly in favor of the Mega.

Very slightly, and that assumes stuff about the screen and backlight that you are guessing about.

OrangeCream wrote:

Everything else is equal except now computationally you have less to draw on screen, meaning then you are using less CPU/GPU on a Mega compared to an S4. So now there are two factors that favor the Mega's power consumption over the S4.

But the 5410 isn't marginally more efficient than the 5250, it will race to idle just as well as the 5250 if not better, and in low power situations it should be vastly superior. I doubt that drawing the screen is going to make much difference. Maybe if all you did was run games at the native resolution the Mega might beat the S IV, but typically I would expect the S IV to thrash it.

Android is now by default GPU accelerated. JB and apps will use more GPU on the GS4 than on the Mega due to there being more pixels.

This is not about idle power, it's about active power. The screen should use slightly less power, and it's not theoretical that white/grey backgrounds use more power on an OLED than an LCD. The GPU will be taxed less, drawing less pixels, and the CPU for anything not yet fully GPU accelerated due to less pixels.

The only reason this might not be true is because the 5250 is a 32nm part and the 5410 is a 28nm part, the presence of the little cores, and the difference in power use between Mali and PowerVR.

I cannot account for those differences yet, but it is in fact possible that the Mega could have longer battery life if the two SoC are comparable in power draw.

Android is now by default GPU accelerated. JB and apps will use more GPU on the GS4 than on the Mega due to there being more pixels.

Most of the time the screen is essentially static, even when drawing the main operation is blitting and compositing, about as simple as it gets. GPU power is significant in really only one scenario, games. In almost all other cases it will be dwarfed by other parts of the phone.

You can see this with the developer options on an Android phone. It's worth having a look at if you get the chance.

OrangeCream wrote:

The only reason this might not be true is because the 5250 is a 32nm part and the 5410 is a 28nm part, the presence of the little cores, and the difference in power use between Mali and PowerVR.

But those differences are large, an older process, no power saving cores, much more advanced at it seems power hungry GPU. The 5250 is fast, but it it not frugal. It's saving grace is that it can plow through work quickly and get back to sleep or low clocks.

In the case of the 5410 the A7s make a big difference under almost all scenarios, about the only cases where they don't is things like web benchmarks, but even those are not very realistic as they tend to run at a greater rate than typical web usage. i.e. They test maximum rather than typical performance.

But say that hypothetically the Mega 6.3 did have good battery life, I'd really want to know why so far it's only turned up in the Nexus 10, ARM Chromebook and a jumbo-sized phone. Its presence in those particular devices does not lead me to believe it is at all battery friendly.

The Nexus 10 seems to have reasonable battery life; yes, it has a bigger battery than an iPad, but it's got a larger and more pixel dense screen, too. Drop it's density and the screen efficiency goes up (more light transmitted, less necessary LEDs, less necessary battery).

I don't think SoC is as big a deal as you make it out to be, especially since Apple's been using 45nm parts that get great battery life (see iPad 3!). Push the screen size up and density down and you can improve battery life (the iPad mini uses this equation to good effect, reducing the battery and also reducing the density).

The Nexus 10 seems to have reasonable battery life; yes, it has a bigger battery than an iPad, but it's got a larger and more pixel dense screen, too. Drop it's density and the screen efficiency goes up (more light transmitted, less necessary LEDs, less necessary battery).

The reason the Retina iPad required a larger battery wasn't just higher pixel density, it was also the fact that Apple switched to stronger color filters — which, of course, get you more saturated color, but at the cost of blocking more light, and consequently requiring more backlighting.

I don't know how the Nexus 10 or the other devices you're discussing here do on that score, but it would seem to be a complicating factor.

The Nexus 10 seems to have reasonable battery life; yes, it has a bigger battery than an iPad, but it's got a larger and more pixel dense screen, too. Drop it's density and the screen efficiency goes up (more light transmitted, less necessary LEDs, less necessary battery).

I don't think SoC is as big a deal as you make it out to be, especially since Apple's been using 45nm parts that get great battery life (see iPad 3!). Push the screen size up and density down and you can improve battery life (the iPad mini uses this equation to good effect, reducing the battery and also reducing the density).

The 5250 draws more power than any other contemporary ARM SoC, with the GPU and CPU fully active it can go as high as 8W, alone they peak around 4W. Intel and Qualcomm parts are typically around half that running the same workload. The only reason the 5250 is usable at all is that the performance is high enough that in energy terms it's competitive with the likes of the A9, if not better; but the likes of Krait are just as good, and the Krait 300 used in the Qualcomm S IV is a lot better still.

If the In kernel Switcher works as intended on the CPU side a 5410 should deliver 90% of the performance of the A15s alone at 60% of the power.

Now the S IV with the 5410 is clocked lower at 1.6 GHz, and has a newer process, but there are 4 cores, so the precise TDP is a bit of a mystery. That said taking all the differences into account the typical energy reduction for the CPU side of the 5410, compared to a 5250 in the Mega 6.3 doing the same work, should be around 50%. The GPU is another matter, but even there Mali T-604 appears to be quite power hungry, which is not surprising given the capabilities and performance.

If the 5410 doesn't thrash the 5250 from an energy point of view something has gone badly wrong with big.LITTLE.

I know a few people who use 7 inch tablets as their phones. The Mega 6.3 is close to that screen size but far lighter and more pocketable.

There are a lot of people in Asia in particular for whom the smartphone is their main screen. They don't own tablets or even PC's or they may have one PC shared by a household. The Mega could be a very attractive device for them particularly if priced aggressively.

Overall the mid-priced phablet seems a smart new niche for Samsung to enter. There is enough to differentiate it from the Note series (S-pen, processor, screen, camera)while still having decent enough specs to tempt price-sensitive buyers.

The iPhone 5 is 4". If I had to guess, I'd say both the iPhone 5S and the rumored low-cost iPhone will also be 4", and next year's iPhone 6 will get a little bigger. But I also suspect Apple may shorten the iPhone release cycle, so the iPhone 6 could show up well before fall 2014.

I personally own an iPhone 5, and I've got an S3 from work. I'm fine with Android, but I hate the width of the S3. If Apple starts increasing the size of the iPhone, I'm going to dump them for a smaller Android phone.

I'm not the only the Apple customer that feels that way.

No, but the question is if you and the other people who feel that way are a minority or not. Or even enough to move the needle.

The term phablet was first coined around 2008, about when the 5" Dell Streak was one of the exemplars for the term that you even referenced in your OP.

It isn't a relative term; 5" today is still a phablet and if the original premise is to be held true that there exists a market for 5 inch+ phones then it is also congruent that the phablet is a mass market and not a small niche.

You can disagree that 5" is phablet all you want, but the point is still valid; the GS4 is a litmus test for the 5"+ phenomena.

The term phablet was first coined around 2008, about when the 5" Dell Streak was one of the exemplars for the term that you even referenced in your OP.

It isn't a relative term; 5" today is still a phablet and if the original premise is to be held true that there exists a market for 5 inch+ phones then it is also congruent that the phablet is a mass market and not a small niche.

You can disagree that 5" is phablet all you want, but the point is still valid; the GS4 is a litmus test for the 5"+ phenomena.

If the GS4 is a litmus test, why isn't the GS3 one? Apart from the screen, he GS4 is physically the same size/smaller than the GS3.

No, but the question is if you and the other people who feel that way are a minority or not. Or even enough to move the needle.

Unfortunately, I don't think there'd be a good way to tell unless Samsung made a Galaxy S IV Mini that matched the real Galaxy S IV's hardware. There have been nearly-high-end Android phones in smaller sizes (though still larger than iPhone5), but never with the same carrier availability or marketing push.

The iPhone's sales numbers suggest that there's a huge market for small phones, but not everyone chooses them for that reason. Still, they move the needle! And I think the iPhone4S is the first old model to sell almost as well as the new one - up to then, the vast majority were paying the extra $100 for the newest model. At the very least, I'll argue that the screen size increase hasn't drawn many people in.

The term phablet was first coined around 2008, about when the 5" Dell Streak was one of the exemplars for the term that you even referenced in your OP.

It isn't a relative term; 5" today is still a phablet and if the original premise is to be held true that there exists a market for 5 inch+ phones then it is also congruent that the phablet is a mass market and not a small niche.

You can disagree that 5" is phablet all you want, but the point is still valid; the GS4 is a litmus test for the 5"+ phenomena.

If the GS4 is a litmus test, why isn't the GS3 one? Apart from the screen, he GS4 is physically the same size/smaller than the GS3.

My mistake then! I thought it was a larger phone! In that case it's not even a problem and will sell handily. I was thinking of the Dell Streak, which at 152mm is a good 16mm longer.

The iPhone 5 is 4". If I had to guess, I'd say both the iPhone 5S and the rumored low-cost iPhone will also be 4", and next year's iPhone 6 will get a little bigger. But I also suspect Apple may shorten the iPhone release cycle, so the iPhone 6 could show up well before fall 2014.

I personally own an iPhone 5, and I've got an S3 from work. I'm fine with Android, but I hate the width of the S3. If Apple starts increasing the size of the iPhone, I'm going to dump them for a smaller Android phone.

I'm not the only the Apple customer that feels that way.

No, but the question is if you and the other people who feel that way are a minority or not. Or even enough to move the needle.

For me, it comes down to having different sizes for different use cases, and I don't see why others would feel differently. I mean, they do, obviously, but I don't get it.

Even though the phone and the tablet do largely the same thing and run the same software, I couldn't replace the one with the other because of portability. I always carry my phone with me everywhere I go, and it's not a problem because it fits in my pocket.

The tablet weighs more and doesn't fit in my pocket. Even if the tablet weighed the same as the phone, it's still too bulky to stick in a pocket, so I have to carry it everywhere and set it down somewhere if I want to use my hands. It's extremely inconvenient. A 7" tablet is better, but it's still the same problem. If I carried a purse or messenger bag or something, that'd be different, but I don't. And if you start going down to 5" or 6" size for portability, then you're starting to lose the appeal of the tablet in the first place.

I just don't see why you would want to only carry a tablet with you, and the phablet is exactly that.

The term phablet was first coined around 2008, about when the 5" Dell Streak was one of the exemplars for the term that you even referenced in your OP.

It isn't a relative term; 5" today is still a phablet and if the original premise is to be held true that there exists a market for 5 inch+ phones then it is also congruent that the phablet is a mass market and not a small niche.

You can disagree that 5" is phablet all you want, but the point is still valid; the GS4 is a litmus test for the 5"+ phenomena.

If the GS4 is a litmus test, why isn't the GS3 one? Apart from the screen, he GS4 is physically the same size/smaller than the GS3.

Not only that, but if the GS4 is going to be the litmus test, then I will go ahead and call it. The GS4 is going to sell VERY VERY well.

No, but the question is if you and the other people who feel that way are a minority or not. Or even enough to move the needle.

Unfortunately, I don't think there'd be a good way to tell unless Samsung made a Galaxy S IV Mini that matched the real Galaxy S IV's hardware. There have been nearly-high-end Android phones in smaller sizes (though still larger than iPhone5), but never with the same carrier availability or marketing push.

The iPhone's sales numbers suggest that there's a huge market for small phones, but not everyone chooses them for that reason. Still, they move the needle! And I think the iPhone4S is the first old model to sell almost as well as the new one - up to then, the vast majority were paying the extra $100 for the newest model. At the very least, I'll argue that the screen size increase hasn't drawn many people in.

You have no idea how many choose them for that reason (their size). I would guess very few, imo. The 4S MIGHT suggest otherwise--except it was priced cheaper. Cheaper is a great motivator.

People are buying iPhones DESPITE their size, not BECAUSE of their size.

You have no idea how many choose them for that reason (their size). I would guess very few, imo. The 4S MIGHT suggest otherwise--except it was priced cheaper. Cheaper is a great motivator.

People are buying iPhones DESPITE their size, not BECAUSE of their size.

I don’t have a way of knowing. But $100 cheaper can’t be that big a deal, because old iPhone models have always been $100 cheaper per year, yet they didn’t sell that well until the 5 came out. It was probably the lack of any major new feature in the 5; the 4 introduced the high-resolution screen, and the 4S, Siri. A taller screen just didn’t have the same effect.

My beef is not the screen size, it's the odd combination of components.

Sounds like something aimed a emerging markets honestly. Big, flashy, functional but also fairly cheap to make. I'd be surprised if it launches in the US, although maybe a variant will end up there eventually.

The GS4 is smaller in size than the GS3 and has a bigger screen. Every phone should follow this trend of reducing bezels. The other very smart thing both the GS4 and HTC One do is using the bottom bezel for capacitive buttons. Phones like the Nexus 4 have the same bottom bezel which is unused, and screen space is wasted on soft keys.

So yes, there is still room for phone screens to become bigger, while the actual device stays the same (or marginally bigger) size. Its win-win for all.

This week The Carphone Warehouse confirmed that around 30 percent of its Galaxy S4 sales so far were from consumers switching from Apple’s iPhone.

I think we can safely say that 5" phones have a market, of course the question is do 5"+ phones have a market, that means Note and Note-like phones. The Note certainly seems to have done well, but I've no idea how well other large phones have sold.